PAULINE
He’d promised me a boon in return. Power. Influence. The kind of magical favor that could be cashed in when needed most.
So I’d handed her over.
I still remembered the night. How easy it had been to lure her away from pack grounds. How little she’d suspected until it was too late. How satisfying it had felt to watch her dragged away, screaming, when she finally realized what was happening.
Dimitri had raged when she disappeared. He’d torn through pack territory looking for her. He’d threatened to kill whoever was responsible. He’d even threatened to divorce me when he’d suspected, though he could never prove anything.
But like all wounds, time had healed that one too. The rage faded. The grief dulled. Life moved on.
Until now.
Until this Fia girl appeared with Athena’s face.
The resemblance wasn’t just passing. It was uncanny. The same bone structure. The same eyes. The same way of holding herself that made something primal in me want to rip her apart.
And Dimitri had seen her too.
I’d watched his face when he’d first laid eyes on the girl. I had watched the recognition dawn. I’d seen something old and painful flicker across his features before he’d locked it down and pretended nothing was wrong.
Why did this girl have to look like her? Why did the universe insist on throwing Athena’s ghost back in my face?
The last words she’d said haunted me. They came back at night when I couldn’t sleep. When I lay in my perfect bed in my adequate chambers and stared at the ceiling.
You can get rid of me, she’d said. But I will haunt your narrative and your family till your blood dies out. You will never forget this face. No matter how much time casts a spell on you.
I’d buried that memory as deep as I could. Covered it with years, distance and denial. But it clawed its way back up whenever I closed my eyes on some nights.
A movement caught in the mirror made me freeze.
I saw a flicker of shadow where no shadow should be.
"I told you never to do that." My voice came out sharp and cold. "You don’t sneak up on me."
The shadow solidified and took shape as it became a girl stepping into the light cast by the guest room lamps.
She was young. Seventeen, maybe eighteen. Dark hair that hung straight and lifeless around a pale face. Eyes that held too much knowledge for someone her age.
"I apologize." Her voice was soft, carefully neutral. "You told me to make myself invisible to everyone on these grounds."
"There’s no saving you, really."
I turned back to the dresser and picked up my brush and began working it through my hair. The grey streaks were more visible now. New ones appearing every day like little flags of surrender.
I started braiding. The familiar motion helped calm the agitation still churning from my conversation with Aldric.
"Number four, was it a success?" I asked without looking at her.
She nodded. I could see the movement in the mirror.
"Yes."
"Details."
"It looked like an accident." Her words came measured and precise. "A few might survive. Maybe one or two. But the Omega girl... I watched her die."
Good. That was good. One less thorn in my side. One less complication. Athena’s ghost was dead as quicky as it came.
"I took this as a trophy."
She held something out. I finished tying off my braid and turned to look. It was a phone. The screen was shattered, spiderwebbed with cracks. Dark stains marked the case.
"This has too much serial killer vibes to it," I said flatly. "I do not appreciate it and I hate that you did not even consider that this could be tracked to us. Destroy it."
Number Four closed her hand around the phone. I watched it crumble and actually disintegrate before collapsing into powder and fragments that fell through her fingers like sand.
"I want it far away from here."
"Will do."
She started to leave but stopped. I saw her hesitate in that way that meant she had something else to say.
"What?" I demanded.
"There was something odd."
"What?"
Number Four scratched at her hand. The gesture seemed unconscious, nervous.
"She resisted my second will. Did she have witch blood by chance?"
"Fuck do I know." I waved the question away. "But she’s dead. That’s all that matters now."
The girl scratched at her hand again. This time I caught a glimpse of the wound there. It looked like tree bark. Rough, dark and spreading across her palm.
"It looks like you pushed yourself too much."
I opened the dresser drawer and found the pill bottle I kept hidden beneath my lovely scarves. I shook one out and held it toward her.
"Here. Swallow."
She took it, placed it on her tongue and swallowed dry. I watched the wound on her hand slowly close. The bark-like texture faded before it smoothed and then it disappeared completely until there was nothing but unmarked skin.
"Thank you, mistress."
"No need to thank me. Just do your job as my healer and you get to live a long life." I turned back to the mirror. "Now leave. I need my beauty sleep."
Number Four moved to the window and opened it without a sound. The cold night air rushed in, bringing the scent of dying leaves. Autumn was nearing.
I watched her jump.
It still took some getting used to. Seeing her leap feet down. But I heard no impact. There was no sound of landing. She simply vanished into the night like she’d never existed at all.
The window closed behind her, shutting itself with a soft click.
I sat in my chair and stared at my reflection again. At the woman I’d become in my fight to hold onto everything I’d built.
Outside, Silver Creek slept. Dimitri was probably in someone else’s arms. Athena’s ghost watched from wherever the dead went. And I sat alone in this inadequate chambers with my grey-streaked hair and my aging face and my carefully maintained throne.
What a life.